


Interiectio: Changbin

by AnssiIndustrial



Series: Bohema [4]
Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Famous, Art, Changbin gives himself one last chance, Drabble, Gen, LITERALLY, Slice of Life, another character appears at the end, changbin is a starving artist, may be read as a standalone but is a part of series, mentions of heavy drinking, rated t for excessive foul language and our character's choices, we can only guess for now, who is he?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-01-14 13:57:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18477643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnssiIndustrial/pseuds/AnssiIndustrial
Summary: Life is hard if you're a nonconformist.Life isespeciallyhard if you're also an artist.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Could be read as a standalone. Unbeta'd.

Changbin was fucked.

“What do you mean, you won’t pay?” he growled to his phone, blood boiling at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. “I spent a whole week on this piece that _you madame_ , wanted me to paint for you!”

He listened to the woman on the other side, feeling all the fight and anger slowly leaving his body with every word.

“Fine. But I am not returning the money you paid in advance” he mumbled finally after her monologue and hung up without saying anything else.

_Motherfu-_

The man put down the handset. His legs turned to jelly and he had to sit down on the dirty floor, right in front of his finished and apparently unwanted commission piece.  
It was a renaissance inspired painting, all light and green, with nude and fat little angels, laughing and dancing in a garden. Delicate but bold in a way. 

_Fuck, he really was proud of that piece._

Changbin looked around his poor excuse of a flat. One could make a mistake and think it was an atelier, and it was, but he also lived there since he was a living and breathing definition of a ‘starving artist’. He simply couldn’t afford anything bigger than this attic.

His chin trembled and he felt hot tears slide down his face. 

That rich cunt with a Rubens fixation fucking forgot to give him a call and cancel the commission, what the actual fuck? He wasted a whole fucking week on this fucking piece and now he wouldn’t even get his hard earned money.

“Shit.”

Changbin laughed hysterically through the tears. How on earth was he going to pay for supplies? What would he eat?

 

He was so, _so_ horribly fucked.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Changbin has fallen, but he gives himself one last chance to try again.

It’s been almost a whole day since Changbin last ate and the only thing he had in his fridge now was alcohol.

He was laying on his makeshift bed that was, in fact, an old mattress on wooden crates. Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto no.2 was blaring out of two loudspeakers that he found somewhere in a bin, when he was still a high school student, young and full of hope for a brighter future.

Changbin snorted.

Look how well it turned out for him. He was pretty sure, he was going to actually die of hunger this time. Alone and drunk, probably.  
Speaking of drunk, he was decidedly too sober for another existential crisis of this magnitude. Fuck that.

And so, an hour later (more or less, his clock stopped working about a week before and he hasn’t gotten to changing the batteries yet), Changbin was already pretty much drunk, unfortunately the buzz disappeared too quickly for his liking, leaving him even more depressed than he felt before. Alcohol never helped. Or at least, not for long. So, he did what he knew how to do best – he took up a brush and started painting.

The music changed into something way more sinister, Changbin couldn’t remember for the life of him what it was exactly, but he was pretty sure it was some kind of movie soundtrack, since he couldn’t think of any classical composer (but maybe he was just too drunk).

Soon enough, he stopped caring about everything. He fell into a frenzy, heart beating wildly and head spinning, but his grip on the brush was steady and his every move precise.

He painted, darkness and fury and despair taking shape on canvas until he couldn’t even see what he was doing anymore, since the sun has set. He was panting, gulping for air when he finished, fresh paint decorating not only his creation, but his clothes and skin as well.

He felt dizzy.

_So… dizzy…_

 

When Changbin regained consciousness, it was completely dark and quiet. He pushed himself up from the floor, where he’d been laying in a puddle of paint, left cheek and temple sore. As soon as he stood up, he realized that his whole left side hurt.

He must have fallen pretty hard.

He wasn’t alarmed though. It wasn’t the first (nor would it be the last) time. It’s just how things were. He got used to being a living failure at some point. Failure at school, a useless son, shitty artist, a drunk, almost homeless… he could list many more things he sucked at. Life, for example, if he was being honest.

He switched on the light and hissed when the brightness hurt his eyes. When it was finally safe to open them fully, his gaze immediately wandered to the empty bottles, littered on the floor.

_One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven._

Ah, so he fell again, straight into the rabbit hole.

Not for the first time, no. But after long and painful rehab he certainly hoped he wouldn’t slip again. What a weak person he was - another thing to add to the list.

His eyes filled with tears, helplessness and loneliness eating him alive.

“I don’t deserve anything” he whispered to himself, his soft voice echoing slightly in the mostly empty space of his room. 

He felt a crippling anxiety gripping his veins slowly, starting from his hands and moving up towards his lungs and heart. He fought hard to take deep breaths and stop thinking. He couldn’t let himself fall victim to his demons now, because he knew, he might do something dangerous otherwise.

It took him some time, the birds started singing outside, welcoming the dawn of a new day, but he managed to push it all into the back of his mind.

His muscles were shaking from the effort so he let himself fall down on the mattress.

His stomach grumbled.

_Right, he forgot about that tiny little detail._

Changbin bit his lip as he stared at the dirty ceiling. His mind already giving him best possible solution.  
The only problem was, it wouldn’t be pleasant. Not for his ego, that’s for sure. 

But then again, what alternative did he have? He couldn’t think of anything else to do, that could give him money immediately. Unless he wanted to steal, which… no. He promised himself he would never do that again and he won’t. 

He sighed dejectedly and decided it was just not worth it to postpone making a decision any longer. 

Changbin gathered all necessary supplies that were laying all over the floor after his late night stunt, then went out and headed to the nearest park. It’s been a really long time since he had to do that.

“So fucking humiliating”

Still, he knew he had to eat something better than a half rotten banana found in one of his dusty cabinets and soon, otherwise he might faint again.

He ended up sitting on a park bench, basking in the early morning sun, charcoal and paper in hand, trying not to appear too menacing. He people watched for a while, waiting for a perfect moment to engage someone in a conversation and gain a potential client. He was really fucking hungry now.

He couldn’t find it in himself, however, to stop any passerby – everyone looked too busy or unapproachable, and yeah, don’t judge him, but he was a shy, introverted person. If he wasn’t, he’d probably make a career in music, what with his decent singing voice and mild interest in songwriting and composing. 

His shoulders slumped, as he realized he probably wouldn’t be able to eat that day after all.

Which is why he startled, when a shadow appeared in front of him. He looked up and met the eyes of a young man, standing right next to ‘his’ bench, giving him a constipated, maybe even a kind of an angry look.

They stayed like that for a few long moments, none of them breaking the silence, before Changbin ran out of patience.

“Can I help you?” and he didn’t want to sound so curt, he really didn’t. He only wanted to make enough money to be able to eat dinner, nothing else. He didn’t want his day to turn even more shitty because of some random dude, who evidently had a problem with him. _God knows why._

“As a matter of fact, yes” he deadpanned and Changbin froze, not having expected that answer.

The man didn’t break eye contact even for a second. He just… kept looking at Changbin with that almost angry expression.

“I want you to draw me”

_What?_

"What?"

“You heard me” the stranger pouted slightly before he schooled his expression back to that constipated-maybe-angry look. 

“You’ll have to pay beforehand” mumbled Changbin, still baffled. “And no returns.” He added quickly.

The man nodded and sat on the other end of the bench unceremoniously, startling Changbin again.

“How much?”

When Changbin (kind of greedily, but he _was_ starving) stated his price, the man didn’t even complain, only handed the bills to the artist and then kept watching him expectantly.

It was slightly unnerving, but Changbin quickly pocketed the money, already feeling lighter with the prospect of food later, and turned to face him fully. 

“Just do your job properly. I won’t accept it, if it’s ugly.” 

“I will draw you a beautiful fucking portrait, so shut up and let me work” Changbin bristled, offended.

The man (or boy, he looked quite a bit younger than Changbin up close) smirked, finally loosing that weird expression but didn’t say anything else.

Fucker looked way more handsome with that infuriating smile, but Changbin stopped caring as soon as he got into his ‘artistic zone’.

 

_He was going to draw him the best portrait that brat has ever seen, just you wait._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who is the mystery boy? We'll have to wait and find out.
> 
> Thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> We finally got to meet Changbin!  
> Yell @ me on tumblr or twt.


End file.
